Jim Manley, Harry Reid's spokesman, says Reid is hoping to continue to force votes on the matter all week, thereby permitting Republicans to cast several votes if that's what they want to do blocking regulation. This at a time when the polls show, like this one does, that people want this reform passed by better than two-to-one and trust Obama and Democrats more on this issue. Two-to-one means independent voters are solidly with Obama here, which obviously was not the case on healthcare.

Then there's Ben Nelson, the Democrat of Nebraska, who voted with the GOP. What's up with him? He says he was worried that the regs would hit small businesses and others like dentists. Well...this is from today's WashPost:

Nelson said he had opposed starting debate on the bill because he objected to consumer-protection provisions that could harm "Main Street businesses" back home, including dentists, whose patients often borrow to finance major procedures that their insurance policies don't cover, and auto dealers.

But after talking with Nelson, Dodd said, "Dentists and auto dealers did not come up."

But Nelson had also pushed for an exemption — sought by Warren Buffett's Berkshire Hathaway — for firms with existing derivatives contracts from having to post billions of dollars in collateral. Dodd said he spoke with Nelson on the floor before the vote to explain why such an exemption was unacceptable and that the Treasury Department was working on potential compromise language.

Nelson said his final vote on the bill isn't guaranteed. "I'm waiting to see what the final version will be, just like everybody else. I don't know," Nelson said.

Berkshire Hathaway, as US readers know, is based in Omaha, Nebraska.

It sounds to me like a deal might be cut to get Nelson's and Olympia Snowe's votes, and maybe Scott Brown's. We should know by week's end. You'd think Nelson might be a little ashamed after all that "Cornhusker Kickback" publicity, but no. In a way you have to hand it to him.

This is one that, politically, the Democrats can afford to lose. Whereas losing healthcare would have meant political death, on this one, in some ways a loss is good for them politically as they can spend the campaign saying the Republicans blocked common-sense reform of Wall Street, is in their pockets, etc. But they do need to reel Nelson back in so that the opposition at the end of the day is wholly Republican. Alas, if I know this, Nelson knows it, too.